{"id":558923,"date":"2026-04-30T15:37:14","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T15:37:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/558923\/"},"modified":"2026-04-30T15:37:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T15:37:14","slug":"chonkers-the-massive-sea-lion-becomes-star-at-san-franciscos-pier-39","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/558923\/","title":{"rendered":"“Chonkers” the massive sea lion becomes star at San Francisco’s Pier 39"},"content":{"rendered":"

A massive sea lion is stealing all the attention at San Francisco’s Pier 39, along with most of the dock.<\/p>\n

The Stellar sea lion dubbed “Chonkers” has become a star among the hundreds of barking and pungent pinnipeds that have taken over at Pier 39’s K-Dock.\u00a0<\/p>\n

People from across the country are coming to the tourist attraction to catch a glimpse of the pier’s new superstar.<\/p>\n

“I saw on the news about Chonkers in Atlanta, Georgia, and I came all the way to San Francisco to see him,” said one visitor.<\/p>\n

“I’m looking for the big one,” said another. “Looking for Chonkers.”<\/p>\n

\"Chonkers<\/p>\n

“Chonkers,” a Stellar sea lion, takes a load off after throwing his weight around at Pier 39 in San Francisco, April 29, 2026.<\/p>\n

KPIX<\/p>\n

Chonkers was hard to miss. Male Stellar sea lions can weigh between 990 and 2,500 pounds and Chonkers looks to be on the upper end of the scale.<\/p>\n

He arrived at Pier 39 sometime last month, likely due to the abundance of food in the area.<\/p>\n

Droves of sea lions began lounging at the dock shortly in 1989 shortly after the Loma Prieta earthquake hit the San Francisco Bay Area. According to the Pier 39 website<\/a>, within months over 300 sea lions complete took over the dock. In 2024, a record 2,100 sea lions parked themselves at the dock, with the Pier 39 marina providing an ideal living situation because of the available food and shelter from predators. <\/p>\n

\n More from CBS News\n <\/p>\n

In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A massive sea lion is stealing all the attention at San Francisco’s Pier 39, along with most of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":558924,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[4237,90,56,54,55,4407],"class_list":["post-558923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-san-francisco","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=558923"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558923\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/558924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=558923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=558923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=558923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}